Vittoria!
by Mourning Ophelia
Summary: After being trampled on and some serious friend-intervention, Relena gets the last laugh. (1xR-PART 33!)
1. Vittoria!

Relena, at that specific moment in time, was not sure if she should laugh or cry.

She had heard stories about days that had been sent straight from the Satan's charming presence and into our world, but she never had expected one to grace hers. The rioting on L6, Foreign Minister Chazes' lack of integrity . . .

. . . One Heero Yuy engaged in an all-out make out session with her secretary against her favorite soda machine . . . 

Relena sniffed as she walked back to her office in the Preventer's Headquarters.  After five years of having her heart held hostage by the pilot, she had always known that sooner or later she'd end up the ultimate loser.  The worst case scenario was that he would disappear (again) and she'd never see him (again).  You would think that after being felt up by the Foreign Minister and subjected to negotiating with bubbling idiots, that God would at least cut the girl a break and allow her to have the diet drink that would replace her breakfast, lunch, _and_ dinner for the day.

But _no.   That would imply her life was a hell of a lot lovelier than it actually was. _

She could have cleared her throat to snap the two of them out of it, but what good would it have done her?  She wouldn't have been able to down the caffeinated beverage anyway.  The girl—who had once stood up in front of the entire body of Romefeller and declared that the Gundams were soon going to come kick their sorry asses—now turned tail and headed back into her office.  In the end, denial of the whole situation was a lot easier to handle than processing the facts.  

Fact one: Heero never kissed her like _that._

Fact two:  Her secretary (blonde, well-proportioned, and gorgeous next to plain old maid Relena) was a skanky whore.

Fact three:  She still needed to write the letter to the L6 delegation.

Relena sighed as she opened an empty document, feeling better now that she was safe and hidden in her office.  She had half the nerve to lock the door or even leave for the night, but decided against it.  Just walking down the long hallway had made her feel self-conscious and was not something she wanted to repeat at the moment.  Foolish is what she felt like, and a dupe is what she damned herself to forever be.  Did everyone else know about what she had accidentally witnessed for herself?

"Dear God," She began to type, "Please stop making bad things happen.  It isn't funny anymore."

************************

Vittoria

By Ophe

Email: fish@phaedra.nu

Disclaimer: I don't own Gundam W. J

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_Partiro__ da lontano_

_Strada__del__ destino._

_Sogno__ che miaccendi.___

_Ori__ che si vicono_

_Cercare__ la Gloria_

_Euna__ fiamma che brucia dentro.___

- Vittoria! (Aida 2002)

************************

"You've reached Road Kill Café!  You kill 'em, we grill 'em!"  

"Cut the crap, Duo.  I need to talk to Hilde."

"'Jousan?"  Duo was visibly shaken by empty tone, "Eh?  Is something wrong?"

"I need to talk to Hilde."  Relena repeated, her voice nearly cracking.

"Yeah, sure, sure."  Duo turned to his partner with a frown on her face, "Babe, it's for you."  

The slight girl was literally buried under the mound of paperwork on her desk.  After her last rather . . ._ explosive mission with Duo, Une had ordered both to complete all the paperwork for the property damage.  Hilde picked up the phone with a confused look on her face._

"Hello? Oh hey--!"  She paused, "Sweetheart, what's the matter?"

Duo had leaned in to try to catch the hysterical Vice Foreign Minister's voice on the other end.

"No, of course.  I'll be right there!"

"Hey!"  Duo began to frantically point to himself.

"Duo wants to come . . . yeah; I think it would be better if he knew too.  OK, we'll be there in two seconds.  And if I meet that bastard in the hall I'll—!" Duo shrunk back and away from the death glare Hilde was giving to the wall, "Fine, no bodily harm.  But I still get tocastrate him, right?"  

"What happened?  What happened? What happened?"  Duo was bouncing up and down as Hilde set down the floor and moved to the door of their office.

"You're not going to believe me."  She shook her head.

"I will when you tell me!"  He swore, crossing his heart and hoping it wouldn't have to die or stick a needle in his eye.

"Relena walked in on Heero and her secretary molesting each other."

"I don't believe you!"  Duo's jaw sank quickly to the floor.  Reaching over to shut his mouth, Hilde put a finger to her lips as she opened the door, "No talking until we get to her office. It's ten doors down, can you make it?"

Duo's face had gone from cheerful to shock to ready-to-kill-so-called-best-friend in less than five seconds.  He nodded resolutely, zipping is lips with fingers as they stepped out into the hall.

The fifth floor of the Preventer's headquarters housed most of the former pilot's offices as well as the Foreign and Vice Foreign Minister's.  Relena's was all the way at the end of the hallway, and it took the pair a good five minutes to actually get to the door.  

Duo considered himself home free until _it_ appeared at his left.

"Duo."  Heero's monotone grated on his nerves, "Why are you going into Relena's office."  Of course this wasn't a question.  It was a demand.  Did he honestly think that because he was the chief of staff on her security that he got to know everything about the girl?

Duo made a lunge for the man, ready to scratch his eyeballs out with all the fury of a mighty chipmunk on crack cocaine.  Hilde grabbed his arm and yanked him back before he could do anything that the other man rightfully deserved.  

"None of _your fucking business."  She snapped, causing Heero to flinch.  Since when did sweet, innocent __Hilde swear?  Motion with her finger, she began to wipe the side of her mouth.  Realizing quickly that he had 1) been caught , 2) still had lipstick on his face and 3) was about to go into Relena's office with it on, Heero ducked away from the couple and back into the men's restroom._

Hilde looked up to meet her husband's dumbfounded face.

"You . . . go girl."  Duo finished lamely.

"He hurt my best friend's feelings.  He can go shove his--!!" 

Duo pulled her into Relena's office very quickly.

The Vice Foreign Minister had turned her rather large (and extremely heavy) oak desk to face her spacious windows.  On the floor beside it laid her mangled computer's monitor and keyboard—both victims of her sudden spurt of strength.  Relena leaned back in her black leather chair, propping her feet up.  With her arms crossed across her chest and her gaze focused on some indistinguishable point outside, she finally spoke.

"I think I've having a nervous break down."  Her voice was calm and otherwise reserved.

"Nah," Duo offered as he swung two chairs around to sit beside her with Hilde, "I think you just needed a change of scenery."

Hilde punched him in the arm as hard as she could, "I didn't bring you for this reason!"

Relena laughed slightly, "It's OK."

"So what do you want to talk about 'Jousan?  You know we're always here to listen."  Hilde nodded in agreement.  

It took her a moment to find her voice, "Today I was supposed to edit the new Bill of Rights and I came across the word 'Palimpsest.'  And I thought to myself, 'I have no idea what this word means.'  So I went into Minister Chazes' office to ask him even though I was embarrassed.  Apparently, he thought I was asking, 'Will you grab my breasts and my ass?' instead.  I just sat there and let him have his way.  I mean, what was I supposed to do?"

"That's horrible!"  Hilde gasped, having heard only bits of his treachery.  She reached out to grasp her friend's hand.  Duo seemed genuinely shocked.

"Today I was supposed to write a treaty for the rival parties on L6, even though I have no idea what's going on.  Because, what gives _me the right to decide what's best for them when I've never met any of these people before?_

"Today is my birthday, and I'm finally 18.  Today I was supposed to get the day off.  Today I--!"  Her voice finally cracked and she started crying, "Today, the two of you were the only ones who remembered and wished me a happy one.  Today I realized that you two are my only real friends in the entire world, and I am otherwise alone and unfit to do anything but sit here and let others tell me what to do."

"Relena . . ." Duo began, but she cut him off.

"I don't mind being by myself.  It didn't bother me that everyone left me after the war, or that my own adoptive mother began to spread malicious rumors about me to get some publicity.  I didn't care that I let my brother, Treize and Heero plan out my future for me.  I didn't care that my brother and Treize both found 'freedom' in their deaths.  I just smiled and nodded, and whenever I felt like giving up Heero was there holding the gun to my head.  I've been here for five years.  For the last five years of my life I could have been going to school, learning how to drive, doing what _I wanted to do.  But always, Heero was there reminding me how selfish that was._

"And God _dammit," Relena wiped her tears from her eyes and pointed out the window, "Even after five fucking years they still haven't finished that stupid building!"_

Duo and Hilde were speechless.

"I'm sorry," Relena began, releasing Hilde's hand from her death grip, "I shouldn't have laid all of that on you two."

"I . . . 'Jousan."  Duo used his tone that was strictly reserved for scolding Hilde for wanting to do something dangerous and turned to his friend, "For a while I've noticed that you were really unhappy.  I thought that it had to do with Heero, but I guess for the wrong reason.  So, if you don't mind taking orders from one last person, I have some advice."

The two girls both looked at him curiously, "What are you suggesting?"  Relena asked quietly.

"Quit.  Resign.  You're better than this; smart, beautiful and your entire life ahead of you."  A smile spread across Hilde's face at the suggestion.

"I couldn't."  Relena was looking horrifyingly sad again.

"Lena, what Duo is saying—as strange and outlandish as it sounds--is right!  Let the Foreign Minister do his _own work for once."  Hilde's voice of reason shone through._

"But everyone relies on me so much.  You remember what happened right before Mariemaia came, Duo!  The earth and colonies almost went to war with each other again."

"You're right.  But the thing is you need to explain that you can't always be there for them.  You've worked for five years as a complete novice, and what have you gotten?  The entire galaxy on your side, a shitty head bodyguard who tramples on your feelings, and two best friends for life. I mean, _damn,_ girl.  You were a queen, princess, _and world leader while most teens are just going into sophomore year of high school."_

"You _deserve this."  Hilde added._

Relena looked as if she might start crying again.

"You're so much better than this.  You deserve more respect than you've been getting . . . and frankly," Duo leaned in to whisper, "You know what they say about Asian men and their--!"

"DUO."  Both girls blushed to the roots of their hair.

"It's true!"  Finally he cracked a smile too, "And anyway, everyone here in Preventers loves you so much that if you were to walk out and never come back they'd miss you, but love you all the more.  I think the fact that you do most of their work, have learned all of their names and inquire about their families every chance you get—the fact that you _care_ about these people . . . it really gives you the edge."

"I still don't know."  Relena smoothed the hair that had started to fall loose from her frazzled bun.

"Do it!  Do it!  Do it!"  Duo chanted.

"You're not skirting your responsibilities either, Relena.  You haven't taken a single sick day or vacation since you started."  Hilde's smile spread.

"Do it! Do it! Do it!"

"And besides, you can come stay with us any time.  Just because you're leaving to go achieve your dream doesn't mean you'll lose us as friends."

"We've even nominated you for being the god mother of our first kid!"  Duo put in excitedly.

"Hilde, what's _your dream?"  Relena asked, sharing a sad smile with her friend._

"This is," She pointed to Duo, "And you are.  And L2.  And maybe a few kids, grandchildren, and having girl talk with you over coffee."  

Duo was beaming when he solicited, "What's yours?"

Relena seemed to think about this, "I don't know.  I always thought this was, but look how wrong I was."

"Not your fault, 'Jousan.  And anyway, you should have just let me shoot Heero when I first had the chance."

Relena nodded in agreement, "It would have saved us a lot of trouble, wouldn't it have?"

"Eh, the world probably would have been destroyed by Libra or would be under your brother's control, but sure!"  Hilde added quickly.

"Hildeeeee," Duo whined, "You're supposed to on _our_ side!"

"Ah, Death to Heero?"  She offered.

"Death to Heero."  Relena and Duo both confirmed, nodding solemnly.  

They sat in a pleasant silence for a few minutes before Relena finally reached down to unlock the bottom drawer of her desk.  Pulling the entire thing out, she cleared her desk with one swipe of the arm.  Duo looked rather impressed as thousands of pages of documents fell to the ground.  From the desk drawer, Relena pulled out a stuffed bear, a card that had been ripped in two and a single sheet of paper.

"This is the bear and card that Heero gave me for my sixteenth birthday."  Relena explained as she stood up and walked to the three window panels that went from floor to ceiling.  And, as if it was the most natural thing in the world, she began to bang on the windows in an attempt to break one.  Seeing her efforts only crack the window, Duo and Hilde moved to assist, finally sending a shower of glass to the empty street below.   She dropped the bear and card out of the window and smiled as it hit the ground face-down.

Silence.

"That was strangely fulfilling."  She noted.  Hilde and Duo nodded in agreement.

"It would have been better if you had shredded it and let it fall."  

"Yeah, but that would have been littering."

"Heh," Duo laughed, "Good point."

There was heavy pounding on the door in that instant, and all three jumped, "Minister Darlian!  Is everything all right?"

"Yes, Mr. Daniels.  Please have my secretary hold all my calls."

"Preventer Death and Persephone are with her."  Duo called, knowing that the other man would eventually run to get his head of staff, Heero.

"Y-y-yes, sir!"  The young guard seemed to be awed by the fact such senior officers of the Preventers were so close to him.  After a few minutes of watching the bear get run over by two semis, a minivan and two convertibles, Relena motioned for them to follow her back to her desk.

"This," she began as she handed Duo the sheet of paper she had previously taken out, "Is my last gift to the world."

"Dear Earth Sphere United Nation citizens, government officials, ect."  Duo began reading it aloud, "It is with the utmost regret that I inform you that I, Relena Elizabeth Peacecraft-Darlian—I didn't know Elizabeth was your middle name!--, Vice Foreign Minister of the colonies and Earth Delegation, have decided to resign from my position in the government.  

"While it has always been the highest honor for me to help and reach so many of you, I feel that my time in planting the seeds of this beautiful future is now over.  The Vice Foreign Minister office should no longer be available, as the Foreign Minister should be able to handle all of your needs and requests himself.  

"My decision to resign has nothing to do with any of you; however, I feel it is necessary to congratulate each and every one of you for your efforts towards our peaceful times.  Without you, my selfish dream of total pacifism would have never been obtained.  My years of serving you all have filled me with nothing but fulfillment and intense pride.

"What little fortune I may have will be donated to multiple charities in an effort to continue and facilitate the flow of kindness.  Please never give up hope, and more importantly, never stop fighting for what you truly believe in.  Though my time in office is over, I will always be here to silently observe and help those in need. Thank you, and good night.

"Forever yours, Relena Elizabeth Peacecraft-Darlian."  Relena finished with him.

Hilde wiped a tear from her eye, "When did you write that?"

"My second day in office."  Relena began with a sheepish grin, "There's also a will and letter to the world if I should have been killed, as well as a rather vulgar 'Go to hell!' letter addressed to some people I would rather not mention at this moment."

Duo gave her an approving nod, hugging both her and Hilde to him, "Oh my girls, my girls.  Whatever shall I do with the two of you?"

Finally, a truly brilliant smile flashed across Relena's face as she took the letter from him and grabbed her briefcase, "Watch me change the world."

************************

The waves of revolution were quickly spreading through the Preventer's headquarters.  

There was a knock at the door of Wufei Chang and Sally Po's office.  The sight of a slight blonde with the rare smile on her face warmed Sally's heart as soon as she opened the door.  Moments before, she had heard the window break and watched as a "certain something" made a nose drive towards the ground.

"Hi Sally, Wufei!"    Relena called cheerfully, waving.  From behind her, Duo and Hilde were both grinning like idiots.

 "Sally, do you still have that five hundred page document that I asked you to look over for me that was for the Foreign Minister?"

"Yes, but I haven't started it . . ." Sally began sheepishly. 

"Oh good, because I would have felt really guilty if you had."

Wufei looked up from his own paper work, "Maxwell, why the hell are you smirking like that?"

"Oh Wu-man, you'll see."

"Maxwell . . ."

Unlike her office, Sally and Wufei's window opened.  If it was possible, the smirk grew even more.  The light wind coming in lifted her hair, almost approving of her course of action.

"Here you are, Relena."  Sally lifted the cardboard box, "I feel really bad about—oh _my God_, what are you _doing_?!"  Wufei spun around in his chair to see what had gotten his partner so flabbergasted.

Relena hefted the box up, turned it over, and dumped its contents out onto the street below.  The people on the sidewalk watched in dull amusement as the document was scattered throughout the street and on their heads like a snowstorm.  An elderly couple stopped to pick up some of the papers and read them, but when they saw that the topic was environmental sanctions and not a political scandal, they discarded them quickly.  The price of the ticket she'd be receiving for littering would never add up to the priceless look on Wufei's face in that very same instant.

"Woman!"  He called after her as she strolled past Sally and back towards the door, "What the _hell_ has gotten into you?!"

"Bye Wufei!  Sally, call me if you need anything!"

The aforementioned woman nodded dumbly as Hilde poked her head back in, "What are you two waiting for?  You _have_ to watch this."

By the time the four caught up with her, Relena was knocking on another door, taking off her pearl earrings and necklace.  When Trowa's face emerged at the door, she grabbed his hand and put them in it.

"Give these to your sister for me."

Trowa nodded, knowing exactly what was going on without even opening his mouth to ask.  

"I'm always here for you."  He offered, and she patted his cheek kindly.

"Take care of yourself while I'm gone, Trowa." 

She began to march back down the hallway, and upon Duo's insistence, Trowa joined their little rally of support.  It was evident by the new swing of her hips and the way she walked that this was a new, independent woman.  This was a _truly scorned woman, and even Trowa felt his penis shrink at the mere sight of her._

Relena slammed her briefcase down into the closest trash can, attracting even more attention.  Apparently word was spreading quickly via Relena's (skanky whore) secretary, and every now and then another preventer would poke their head out to watch the show.

"Good luck, Miss Relena!"  Daniels called from his spot by the vending machines.

"We'll miss you a lot!"  Relena waved to the secretaries she gossiped with in the morning.

"Come back and visit us soon!"  

Taking off her blazer, she shoved it into the next trash can.

"Take care of yourself!"

She slowed her pace only to take off her perfect white pumps and dumped them in the trash as well.  Sally and Hilde cracked up at the sight of Relena shedding the popular sign of feminine torture.  The elevators at the end of the hall opened and at least a dozen Preventers spilled out to watch the scene as well.  How many times did one see the former Queen of the World have a mid-life crisis at 20?

The doors to the private conference center exploded open, causing its three occupants to look up abruptly.  Hurricane Relena stormed through, leaving a pair of confused guards in her wake.

"I'm sorry Vice Foreign Minister Darlian, but you can't be in here."  Une protested.  Heero moved from his position to escort her out of the room.   Her lack of shoes and coat went unnoticed as she ducked under his arm and avoided him all together.  Slamming down a sheet of paper in front of the security outlines he had been looking at, Relena favored the Foreign Minister with a sickeningly sweet smile.  His eyes went wide at the second sentence, and Relena merely felt giddy at the sight.

Lady Une gasped as she leaned over and scanned the letter as well, "This is--!"

"Give my regards to Mariemaia, I'll be sending her birthday present out shortly."  

Heero glanced between the letter and the familiar faces crowding the door, desperate to mask confusion that was evident on his face.  Relena did not say another word as she left the room, ripping her hair tie from her hair and letting it fall loose.  As she passed her smiling friends, she unbuttoned the top two buttons of her silk blouse.  The feel of the cold marble against her feet and the end to her hair-induced migraine almost made her skip in delight.  

She had pushed the "down" button on the elevator before she finally met with some resistance.

"What are you doing?"  Heero whispered gruffly, reaching for her arm.   He must have thought that increasing his grip would halt her exit, "Think about the consequences for _once in your life!"  _

Foolish male mortal.  She placed her other hand on her hips and gave him the once-over, silently asking 'Who in the hell do you think you are?' 

The empty elevator slid open with a cheerful '_ding!'_

She ripped her arm from his grip, not even bothering to meet his sub-zero gaze. Relena waited until she was inside the elevator with the doors sliding shut before doing anything at all.

A smirk crossed her face as she enthusiastically flipped him off, "Eat shit and die, Mr. Yuy."

The last memory she would ever have of the wretched place was Heero's astonished face, and the roar of approval from the audience in the background.

_Cuore__ magnifico!_

_Dacci__ il miracolo._

_Cuore__ magnifico!_

_Miracolo__!_

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Author's note:  This is the result of my anger towards all the weepy 1xR fics where Relena has to go to a mental institution after Heero tortures her emotionally (even though most were really well written and deserve to be read).  I mean, as out of character as this might have seemed to you, I've always considered Relena to be a REALLY strong person.  It's more OOC for me to have her not be able to walk away and come out the victor.  And I think a few people might have issues with what I had her say at the end, but in all honesty, he was an ass and she got tired of it.  I'm dealing with similar feelings; no matter how much I loved the guy, I'd rather cuss him out than cry over him and let someone like that destroy my life. :3

I have an idea for a better conclusion for this that would involve a little 1xR, and flashes forward seven years or so.  But I'm not going to start writing it if no one will end up reading it. ^^;; So let me know if that would interest you!

EDIT:  *points up* I have to really apologize, and I wouldn't have realized how bad the above came out without Kristen Elizabeth's review (thanks, btw!).  I came off like, "If you do not review I will be an evil bitch nazi and not write! wahahahaha!"  when I meant it more as a gauge to measure when I should start it next.  I would have continued it anyway, I just was trying to figure out when to start it next (and that's not an excuse!  fanfic writer's honor!).  For example, if like two people reviewed I would say to myself, "Oh, I can at least wait until a few weeks after school starts..." but more than that would have had me writing on Saturday and Sunday before school comes back into session.  I know it seems retarded that I would do that with something as stupid as reviews, but I have the tendency to panic about stuff like this.  I would rather be able to plan and dish it out (because I am more than WILLING to sit and write the next part in another three hour session) than sit here twiddling my thumbs thinking, "Oh, I don't know when I can come back to finish this fanfiction..."  So yeah, sorry about that. XD;;  I cleaned up some of my poo poo spelling mistakes too.

The lyrics I used in this fic were from the opera "Aida" which I thought was fitting.  "Vittoria!" translates to "victory!"  

The first set of lyrics:

I will live from afar

On the road to destiny.

A dream which you awaken in me.

Gold to be won;

To seek glory is

A flame which burns within.

Second set:

Magnificent heart!

Make a miracle for us.

Magnificent heart!

A miracle!

3 Ophelia 2003


	2. Bright Lights

After many years of being adored, obsessively worshiped, and praised by many, Doctor Relena Elizabeth Darlian knew when she was being followed.  
  
Keeping her eyes low to the cracked pavement she continued her steadying jogging pace. The early morning sun was blocked by the overcast skies, threatening to pour out their soul at any minute in a vicious downpour. The lush park was too green for this early in spring-and too quiet. Slightly squeaking as they slid over the wet grass, her feet carried her off of the path to cut her morning run short.   
  
Relena was annoyed, angry beyond what was previously thought possible for the small girl. At five foot three and little over ninety five pounds she knew she was no force to be reckoned with. Mind games on a simple rapist or attacker probably wouldn't work in this scenario either. She did, however, have two secret weapons that made her an unstoppable force in halting creepy-old-man-winks.  
  
The first being the ancient martial arts form that Wufei had attempted to teach her for self defense. Relena had been reluctant at first, still clinging to her pacifistic nature. He had gone as far as to point out that she didn't have personal bodyguards anymore, but she still remained unmoved in her independent resolution. It had finally taken a rather close situation with a hairy wilder beast parading around as a man to officially jumpstart her into learning the moves. She was no black belt, but could hold her own in a match with a drunken Scotsman (something Relena would rather not repeat). The second was her mouth, which remained a dangerous entity in its own right. Talking to her in a wrong or inappropriate tone often resulted in a verbal smack down in the nicest way possible.  
  
Her attacker struck just as she rounded a corner into a small patch of trees. The heavy fall and grunt of the person as she arched her leg backwards to smash into their face confirmed her fears of a male assailant. Relena forced her heart back into her chest cavity and started to run directly to her apartment.   
  
The man was resilient; he caught up with her almost immediately. She didn't turn around as he tried to wrap his arms around her from behind-Relena just tried to break free. In all honesty, she'd been in worse situations . . . but those generally involved drugged tea cups and being forced from a car at gun point. Hadn't she left the political world to get away from this warped bad karma?  
  
"Hey! R-!" The voice was vaguely familiar, but she was too wrapped up in her own plotting to actually listen as he tried to force her to the ground. Relena was resolute once more, bringing her right fist up to connect with the man's jaw.   
  
"I am not going to be kidnapped again!!" She shrieked, completely irritated at the audacity of the man. Save for the one Scottish blob of flesh, not one single person without prestige had tried to snatch her since birth. It was almost . . . insulting that this normal, everyday man actually thought that he could capture her.  
  
He was sent reeling back and away from her. Wasting not a single moment, Relena ran full speed home.  
  
******************************  
  
Vittoria! (Part 2: Bright Lights)  
  
By: Ophe  
  
Email: fish@phaedra.nu mailto:fish@phaedra.nu  
  
Disclaimer: standard Mr. D applies!  
  
Note: Thanks for all the awesome feedback! This is part 2/3! I promise it won't go any longer! ^^;  
  
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"New York City is a dangerous place. You can't go running through Central Park thinking you're invincible."  
  
"Still Nick, don't you think it's weird that all this creepy stuff has been happening to me lately?"   
  
He stared over his steaming coffee mug to his friend. "When has 'creepy stuff' not happened to you, Relena?"  
  
The young woman twirled her long blonde ponytail around her finger as she replied. "Oh. Good call."  
  
A rather distinct beeper began to buzz against the smooth counter top. "Speaking of calls . . ." Dr. Nicholas Strewn picked up the mobile device, checked it, and then re-clipped it to his belt. About two moments later, Relena's pink beeper began to ring as well.  
  
"Some coffee break that was," she mumbled, dumping her own mug of coffee down the sink of the Doctor's Lounge. "Are we still on for dinner tonight?"  
  
"Hell or high waters could not keep me away." He promised, ducking back out into one of the many weaving hallways of the hospital. Relena followed him out, re-adjusting her white lab coat and stethoscope. Her face visibly grimaced; the smell of the hospital was still nauseating to her even after being a resident for over two years. Something about the sterile odor of it all never washed out of her hair or her clothes; when she got home and washed her entire wardrobe three times it never left. In a way, she supposed, it was nature's way of reminding her where her place was now.  
  
One of the resident nurses handed her a chart automatically, and she was worked back into the endless stream of patients.   
  
The first patient of that afternoon was an elderly woman who had taken a nasty spill from the top of two flights of stairs. She had broken her pelvis and both arms-all of which Relena reset with careful precision. After prescribing her painkillers and offering kind words and a smile, she was grabbed by a father who needed to find someone who could speak French fluently to discuss his daughter's condition. Years of schooling and practice in the real world had left her accent and speech almost flawless, and her presence and identity escaped no one.   
  
When she had first become an intern at the hospital, the chief of staff was worried that large amounts of people would begin flooding the ER to seek treatment from her. And for a while, they did; endless movements of people who purposely injured themselves to look at her . . . to touch her, and to ask her to run for President of the Earth Sphere United Nation. Over and over, day in and day out, it was the same until she became a resident.   
  
It was amazing that the staff at the hospital even liked her at all.   
  
About four hours into her shift and six emergency operations later, Relena was beginning to feel that certain (and very distinct) presence following her again. Perhaps this morning she had been too panicked to fully take in the stoic aura. In any case, he was here, standing behind her as she reached up in the supply room to grab another box of latex gloves.  
  
Oh, Hell.  
  
"You know Heero," she began, obviously irritated, "there are laws in this country that protect people against stalkers."  
  
"Hn." He leaned against the doorway, she didn't turn around.   
  
From what he could tell from observing the back of her body, Relena had changed tremendously in the last eight years since he'd seen her. Her hair was highlighted naturally, streaks of silvery wisps that reminded him just who she was related to. She also was smaller, thinner in more aspects that one. If he had had a sandwich on hand at that moment in time, he would have force-fed it to her.  
  
"You're not allowed to be in here, Mr. Yuy." She said, brushing past him. Willing her eyes to look at anything but him, she headed straight back to work. You see, Relena Darlian/Peacecraft knew her weaknesses. She knew that by looking at him after so long, seeing his handsome face and hearing his odd sense of humor she'd be tempted to like him again. This, unfortunately for those in the world still pinning for a fairy tale ending for her, was very unlikely to happen.  
  
Heero caught up with her again, shadowing his movements in the park earlier. "I need to talk to you."  
  
"I'm working."  
  
"You're always working."  
  
"Not always. You could have talked to me in the park instead of chasing me down like some rapist or serial killer!" She accused, finally giving into temptation and turning her eyes to meet his.  
  
Relena almost cried.   
  
He was still perfect (save for a rather lovely black eye she had bestowed upon him previously) in his dark trench coat and blue dress shirt. Heero had filled out perfectly and almost towered above her. The way that his eyes gazed into hers intensely and with an unyielding flame reminded her of a time before bloody gloves and dying patients.  
  
"And be told to 'eat shit and die' again? For a former Queen of the World, you seem to have lost all qualities of what a lady is." Heero and Relena both pondered at the very same instant what had possessed him to say that.   
  
"Go to hell." She snapped, her trance broken. Relena was free from his spell once more.  
  
"Already there." He fired back. The doctor starting moving away from him again, and the former head of security was forced to pull out the big guns.  
  
"The world needs you. A rebel group of White Fang remnants are trying to murder you and declare colonial independence."   
  
Relena stopped dead in her tracks; for a moment he was convinced he had finally gotten through to her. Turning back around, her ponytail swinging behind her, she stomped back over to stand at her full height in front of him-dwarfed, but all the stronger.  
  
"You know, Heero? Maybe for a minute I thought that you had come to apologize for being such an ass for so long. But after hearing you flat out lie to my face, I think what little respect I might have had for you has left the building." She shook her head and continued, "Lady Une is still in constant contact with me and would have alerted me instead of sending you who resigned from the Preventers two days after I left."  
  
Heero stood speechlessly, having been caught in the act of fabrication, "Relena, I--!"  
  
"Don't you dare," she whispered, "talk to me like you know me on a personal level."  
  
"I'm not giving up until you agree to come back with me." His own whisper was equally venomous.  
  
"I never want to ever see your face in here again, Mr. Yuy, with any thing less than a gunshot wound to the chest." Ripping her arm away from his grasp she spat out, "Goodnight."  
  
Time seemed to blur by quickly in the hours shadowing the event. Relena had half the mind to call the Maxwells and complain, but noted the immense time difference, and ventured to the snack machine instead. Staring at the Cheetos, no matter how hard she tried to block it from her mind, she could not forget what Heero had said.  
  
"I do not always work." She sniffed, pushing her quarters in the slot with animosity. Her normal schedule was Monday through Friday 8 PM to 8 AM, but she had been working double time in order to get a week off to visit her friends. If anything, it was extremely hypocritical of him to accuse her of it considering the fact her former occupation was a 24/7 ordeal. Was it a crime to work hard for the people? Was it a crime to earn her own living? Was it a crime to actually like her job?   
  
Four years of intense study at accelerated medical school and all she had to show for herself was a diploma, a job, and now, a crumbled bag of Cheetos.   
  
And so what if she had been a "little" hard on the former Perfect Soldier? Telling someone to go eat shit and die wasn't as horrible as telling them that you're going to kill them every other second . . . so therefore, she really had no reason to feel guilty! He could go eat more shit and die again, and it still wouldn't add up to the emotional torment he put her through. This simple conclusion broke the storm that had been brewing over her golden crown of hair, and she was happy again.  
  
That is, until she saw who her next patient was.  
  
The paramedics had rushed him in, calling out random bits of that included, but were not limited to, "Asian descent, adult male" and "gunshot wound to the chest." RJ, one of the EMTs waved her over frantically, trying to snap her out of her astonished daze.  
  
'I'm going to kill him. I'm going to kill him. If he lives through this, I'm going to kill him.'  
  
"Yo Doctor D! Fatal gunshot wound to the chest just outside of the hospital."  
  
. . . or she could just get him busted for carrying unauthorized weapons around with him . . .  
  
"What are his vitals?" She gritted her teeth, and ran with them.  
  
Heero Yuy was not the first gunshot "victim" she had treated, nor would he be her last. Knowing the little bastard, her mind proposed as she snapped her gloves on, he probably managed to miss every single vital organ in his body.  
  
"He's bleeding out! Sanchez, get on the phone now." Relena's head snapped up in shock, having totally missed the moment his heart monitor line went flat. She might have been the bitterest bitch in the universe, but she would have been dammed if she let Heero Yuy die on her shift. Relena moved in quickly, nearly shoving one of the resident nurses to the side.  
  
Her own heart was pounding frantically in her chest; his face had gone very pale and they were forced to open up his lungs using other unnatural methods. While all of this was going on, the former Vice Minister's hands began to work with beautiful, calculated precision. Her professors had always praised her for having a steady hand and good mind-this was just one of the very few opportunities she got to show how truly gifted she was.  
  
Dumping the bullet into a nearby pan, Relena immediately began the blood transfusions. At the touch of her hands, Heero's heart seemingly reactivated itself. A steady sigh of relief escaped through her lips and into the atmosphere. If he had planned it, Heero made sure he wouldn't have to be resuscitated with paddles-unless he honestly trusted her skill as a surgeon.   
  
As irony would have it, the minute they moved Heero into recovery was the minute her shift ended. This prompted immediate accusation towards Heero's scheming mind. Relena left his side for only ten minutes, canceling her dinner with Nick and changing into jeans and a shirt. Releasing her hair from its tight constraint, she let it cascade over her shoulders.  
  
"Excuse me, miss-oh! Doctor Darlian!" Nurse Vatican nearly jumped out of her skin when Relena acknowledged her presence.   
  
"I didn't mean to startle you . . ."  
  
"Oh it's quite all right dear, I was just coming to see if the young man had any ID on him so we could call a relative."  
  
"He doesn't have any." Relena explained, "He's a war orphan."  
  
"You know him?" The nurse gave her an incredulous look, "No wonder . . ."  
  
"Yes, he's an-" Relena fought for the right words, "-old acquaintance."  
  
In his sleep, Heero seemed to groan.   
  
Nurse Vatican nodded knowingly, trying to hide a small smile, "I suppose you'll be filling out his paperwork then."  
  
"I suppose . . ." Relena smiled, "But while you're at it, make sure to mark down on his chart not to give him any of the heavy duty pain medication."  
  
"Why ever not?" The nurse looked alarmed.  
  
"He's allergic to most of them," she lied between her teeth. If he was going to go to all the trouble to shoot himself and nearly give her a heart attack, then Heero was not getting out of this one easily.   
  
"Thank goodness you told me!" The nurse began flipping through Heero's chart frantically. Relena smiled and nodded kindly.  
  
"Well, I wouldn't want to cause any unfortunate accidents . . ."  
  
Nurse Vatican left and came back a few more times, eyeing Relena suspiciously as the young doctor left to change back into scrubs and her lab coat. She would be off duty, but could still monitor Heero's health without objection. Under any other circumstance, she would have had to wait in the ER waiting room like any other normal girlfriend.  
  
Girlfriend? She needed some major nap time.   
  
At about two o'clock in the afternoon, Heero made his first sign of movement, but remained fast asleep. Relena was forced to weave a rather clever story for the police officers about what had happened and agreed to inform Heero about possible "courses of action" that could be taken once he was well again  
  
At three o'clock, he finally spoke.  
  
"Will you talk to me . . . now?" His eyes remained closed, but he knew she was still there.  
  
"No." She sniffed again, "not after what you did, Heero."  
  
"So we're back to first names?"  
  
"What you did was wrong, Heero. It's against the law to try and commit suicide. You could have died-you almost did!" Angrily, she brushed tears from her cheeks. He wasn't in her mind or her heart anymore. She would not fall back onto pining after him like a little virgin maid.   
  
"Trying to have a word with you is breaking the law every second, then."  
  
And anyway, when had the little bastard become so verbose? It was like something had possessed him and warped him into everything she had hoped he would become. A scowl crossed her face and Heero opened his eyes.  
  
"Talk."  
  
"Why did you change your mind?"  
  
"Talk, or else I'm leaving and going home."  
  
"You stayed? For me?"  
  
Relena made a move to get up from the chair, but a strong hand caught hers and held her in her place. She stood like that for a long while, his eyes pleading in that pathetic I-just-shot-myself-I-am-your-hero-don't-go way. With a martyred sigh, Relena sat back down.  
  
"Heero!" She waved her arms around exasperated, "You shot yourself in the chest! What was I supposed to do, let you bleed to death?"  
  
"Then you still do care."  
  
Her mouth opened and closed wordlessly and she blinked back tears. So he had known. In the years that had passed since then, she had just assumed that he was involved with her secretary because she never could find the words to tell him. But if he had known, it meant that he had done it out of spite. Heero knew that was the only machine she got her diet cokes from. He knew that she took her breaks at that time. Had it been a little game to him then? Playing with her feelings like she was some little doll?  
  
It was so low of him, she could not even find words to express her emotions.  
  
Relena stood up and walked out of his curtain, out of the ER, out of the hospital. The rancid smell was turning her stomach, though she had it a feeling that it wasn't the only cause. When she left the Preventer's headquarters and her old life behind, she had been a Amazon princess-unstoppable and wild. Glancing up into the rearview window of the taxi, all she saw was a tired and emotionally abused young woman.   
  
Outside, flurries snow quietly fell and echoed the sentiments of her heart.  
  
******************************  
  
"Are you happy, Relena?"  
  
Blinking her eyes open tiredly, Relena turned her alarm clock off and seriously debated calling in sick to work. The dream she had been having was always the same, and time after time left her feeling unstable.   
  
In it, she was wandering around different places; the Preventer Headquarters, Cinq Kingdom, and even the hospital. Random people-some she knew better than herself and others she had yet to meet-would always come up and ask her the same question, over and over.  
  
"Are you happy, Relena?"  
  
It was a long walk to work though the weather was nice that night and it had stopped snowing. Pulling her jacket around her tighter, she kept her eyes low to the ground. The atmosphere in New York City was still foreign to her after so many years. With so many people moving and milling constantly, it was easy to get lost in a crowd. Sometimes, she believed that if she stood in the middle of it all she would finally disappear. Even in her work, no matter how important or how stressful it became, she could be easily replaced.  
  
And more often than naught, Relena Darlian just wanted to go home.  
  
"Doctor Darlian, how was your afternoon?" It was starting again.  
  
"Fine, thanks. And yours?" Relena never really heard the nurse's reply, but instead ducked into the nearest recovery room.   
  
And then, something truly strange happened.  
  
"Uh, Relena. What are you doing here today?" Even the patient in the bed was looking at her strangely.  
  
She looked up from the chart she had been filling out to Nick, "what do you mean?"  
  
Raising a light brow, he replied, "You're not on the schedule again until two weeks from now." Her grip increased dangerously on the chart, and the other doctor honestly feared for his own life.  
  
Shoving it in her friend's direction, she stomped towards a now very familiar recovery room. Throwing open the curtain and closing it behind her, Relena was greeted with the sight of an "old acquaintance" reading a fashion magazine.  
  
"How dare you?" Heero looked up innocently.  
  
"I don't know what you're talking about." His eye caught the sight of a desirable blue dress shirt, but he bypassed it and turned the page.  
  
Pulling his chart up from the end of the bed, she flipped through it, "And I suppose you're responsible for setting your release date for today as well?" He took careful note of the bitterness in her voice.  
  
"I'd get better pain medications."  
  
Relena stared at him, tears filling her eyes. Heero stared back quite intently, wondering if he had finally cracked through her shell. It had taken months of research and favors via Quatre Winner to track the girl down, and pure hell to actually get the chance to speak with her. If anything, the girl should have taken a little pity on him for his struggle.  
  
"What do you want from me?' She whispered bitterly slumping into the chair she had occupied the night before. "Why can't you just leave me alone?"  
  
"Not in the mission parameters."  
  
"It just figures that you would say something like that, Heero. It just figures."  
  
His gaze questioned whether or not she truly believed that he would have said anything else. She credited her willingness to stay as morbid curiosity, sucked up that ever-persistent ache in her heart, and looked up, "just tell me what you want to know, or just ask me whatever you want to ask. I do have things I need to be doing."  
  
"I can't ask you here. It's private."  
  
Relena clasped one arm with the opposite hand to keep herself from punching the former Gundam pilot in the face.   
  
"Where are you staying then? We'll take a taxi."   
  
Heero gave her another look and seriously wondered if she really knew anything about his habits.  
  
The young doctor sighed and rolled her eyes, "Don't tell me you've been staying in a dumpster or something God-awful like that." If it was emotionally and physically possible for the man, he would have blushed.  
  
"Fine," She began to unhook his IV and heart monitors, "We'll go to my place then."  
  
Hidden beneath the heavy over glow of florescent lights, Heero Yuy faintly smiled.  
  
******************************  
  
"Nice place."   
  
"Well thanks, I try."  
  
"I was giving you a compliment."  
  
"No, you were being condescending."  
  
Heero gave her a sharp look as she threw her keys down on her side table. Falling backwards, she landed on her overstuffed couch and sunk in. Heero remained standing, giving the place a quick once over as so not to appear conspicuous. Truth be told, he had been in her apartment before-twice. Once when she left to go running and then later while she was at work. Some part of his mind had scolded him that it was wrong to do such a thing, but he couldn't help himself. He was always interested in what she was doing, or what was collecting dust in her apartment.  
  
Heero picked up a large frame from the coffee table and glared. Surrounded by a dark silver was a picture of an ugly (who by normal women's standards would have been the most handsome man alive) man who was smiling and hugging Relena to him.   
  
Glancing up from where she had buried her head in her hands, Relena smiled slightly, "That's Eric."  
  
Heero didn't say a word. He was too busy torturing the absent man mentally to formulate any coherent thought. Something in his heart stabbed at the betrayal, and left him feeling bitterer than the biting cold outside.  
  
Relena came up behind him and pulled the frame from his hands with a hard yank, "He's one of my adopted cousins."  
  
Heero's mouth twitched and a wave a relief flew through him.  
  
"You think I would keep pictures of my ex-boyfriends out?" Relena moved to stand in the kitchen, trying to get away from his angry face. She chalked one up for herself and went to make some tea. Deciding against that last finale of "I have four whole shoe boxes of them in my closet,"   
  
"Would you like anything?" He, of course, didn't respond. In retrospect, Relena realized she was happy to have the Heero-normalcy creep back into the environment. She returned with tea for him anyway, and they sat in pleasant silence until Relena turned the television on. Bypassing all news and political channels (Heero took careful note of this), she stopped at the Discovery Health Channel. They watched two open heart surgeries, one kidney transplant and a special on brain tumors before she ordered Chinese food to go.  
  
The doorbell rang and she paid for the food. Sitting back down and opening the lids, she passed a carton over to him. She snapped a pair of chopsticks apart and began to nibble on her rice.  
  
Heero took the beef and broccoli without a word, knowing she had ordered it especially for him. It was sort of ironic that she still remembered his favorite lunch, but only in a way that made him painfully aware of how right eating overcooked beef next to her was.  
  
"I don't have anything for you to sleep in, but I have an extra toothbrush."  
  
He glanced over at her sharply, giving her a curious look.  
  
"It might not be better than a dumpster, but you can sleep on the couch if you want. You'll just have to be careful not to open your stitches." She stabbed at her rice, not looking up.  
  
". . . Thanks." Was all he could manage to croak out in that moment.  
  
She still ate the same way, he observeed. Slow and refined. With him, his hunger had always been unrestrained and he ate freely what was in front of him. She used to joke that it was because he was so used to not having enough, or that he thought someone would take it from him. Relena, on the other hand, would cut her food into small pieces and chew through them thoroughly. In the beginning she had had an appetite that matched his . . . but slowly over time, it seemed to diminish. She stopped eating meat, would only catch one full meal of food in a day, and generally looked very sick and tired. Time and time again he had to literally force her to eat with empty threats of feeding tubes and nutritionists. She would improve and eat much more, but then correct herself and not eat for the rest of the day. He had always suspected that it had something to do with the way the Darlians had raised her-to be perfect, thin, pretty. Calm, reserved, pleasant.   
  
"Why did you leave, Relena?"  
  
Relena looked up at him and smiled briefly before turning her attention back to the television. "Because I wasn't happy, Heero."  
  
He followed her gaze, watching as the doctors ripped the heart from a man's body. And in that moment it was him lying under the harsh light, his open chest exposed to the world.   
  
But in the next, his vision cleared and he distinctly saw his destiny swirled in the sauce of his beef and broccoli.   
  
******************************  
  
Relena could not sleep.  
  
As a diplomat, she had learned to fall asleep on cue. Whether she was on train, plane, shuttle, or automobile, she could close her eyes and drift off. Those sacred moments of sleep came rarely, but when they did, she made every second of them count.   
  
Now, she suspected, she could not sleep because Heero was in her apartment and only separated from her by a wall. What annoyed her was simply the fact that he was there. It wasn't like she hadn't slept in the same room as him, or even next to him before. There had been several diplomatic trips where she would sit staring at his face for the whole three minutes before he woke. When Heero realized he was being watched, his eyes would flash open, but Relena would already be pretending she was asleep. People let their guards down when they were asleep, and Heero was a prime example. The hardness of his features would disappear, and the muscles in his jaw would relax just enough to let his lips part. In moments like those, Relena saw the boy she had met on the beach years before.  
  
Her bedroom door creaked, and she rolled over, pretending to be asleep. Feet moved silently across the floor and she tried to control her breathing as a warm body paused at the foot of her bed. It took approximately one minute, thirty seven seconds for Heero to slid into bed beside her, pressing up against her back. Panic seizing over, she did what any other sane woman would to when a threatening man entered her bed:  
  
Relena kicked him off the bed.  
  
Hard.  
  
A roughly inaudible groan was heard from the floor, and she realized that she probably tore his stitches; and, as scary as it was, she almost didn't care.  
  
"Try again." She mumbled, pressing her face in the pillow nonchalantly.  
  
"May I sleep in your bed?" She was honestly surprised he could ask a question like that in a monotone without the usual stuttering, "The couch is more uncomfortable than the dumpster."  
  
Biting her lip, she didn't reply-which was all good and well, because he took her silence as consent. Slipping in again, this time more slowly and a little farther away, Heero turned so his back faced her own and listened to her breathe. Even though he would never admit it to himself, let alone anyone else, there were times where he would sit and listen to her take air in between her lips and out of them just so he could join her in sleep.   
  
Relena shifted so she was facing his back and whispered, "Turn around."  
  
Out of curiosity, he did what he was told. It caught her off guard to see him in just boxers, but she swallowed the lump in her throat and avoided his gaze. Brushing her fingers lightly over his (self-inflicted) wound, Heero almost seemed to shudder. Thankfully, none of his stitches had been pulled as he flew backwards out of the bed.   
  
"Are you happy now?" He whispered.  
  
Tears began to fill her eyes again, ". . . yes, I think I am." Relena tucked her chin down onto her chest and moved her hand away from his warm skin.   
  
"Heero," she whispered again, "would you like to come to Hilde and Duo's barbeque with me tomorrow?"  
  
"Yeah. I think I would."  
  
  
  
******************************  
  
Mou? Next and final chapter: Duo and the shmuck award, a near-empty condom box, and jealously rears its rather ugly head. 


	3. White Flag

Heero had obviously never lived in a big city, let alone New York, before.

He had insisted that it should be him to wave frantically on the street corner to grab the attention of a taxi driver. There had been at least eight that had blitzed right by him, and Relena bit back a smile in her own private amusement. When he wasn't muttering profanities in Japanese, she saw him reach for his side—the spot where his gun should have been.

"Heero," she stood up from where she sat on her small carry on bag, "would you like me to try? We're going to miss the flight—and besides, your ten minutes are up."

Heero had the audacity to snarl curses in her direction as she breezed by him. Pulling her knee length skirt up just a slight two inches, unraveling her many layers of jackets, and putting the most desperate look of innocence and beauty on her face, Relena faintly called out, "Taxi!"

Four taxis immediately screeched to a halt. Relena moved to the closest and rattled off their destination. She turned and gave Heero a triumphant smile; he merely slid into the taxi citing, "Cheater."

"Sore loser." She shot back.

Since he had lost, Heero had to pay the taxi fee and drag their suitcases (she had loaned him a stylish pink one and brought him shopping—Heero now knew, lived, and breathed the true definition of metrosexualism)—not that he would have ever made her carry hers—to their terminal. They talked pleasantly and caught up, or more specifically, Relena caught Heero up on Duo and Hilde.

"So they have a daughter now? And Hilde is pregnant again?" Heero leaned back into the stiff plastic chair, watching as the first class passengers began to board the shuttle to L2.

"Yes, Elizabeth. She's my and Quatre's god daughter."

"...Your and Quatre's...?"

Relena gave him a strange look, "Just because we're not married or a couple doesn't mean we can't share the responsibility."

"I know, it just seems a little off that they gave the two wealthiest the same kid and didn't try to even it out a little more." Heero rubbed the tension from his back.

"So? We spoil her rotten. Everyone is an 'auntie' or an 'uncle,' so she makes off like a bandit. And besides, this was before Dorothy and Quatre got married secretly in Sweden."

Heero fell forward in exasperation.

* * *

Vittoria! (Part 3: White Flag)

Disclaimer: I don't own anything, anyone, or their bodily organs.

Author's Note: Sorry for the delay! This is part 3/3. Thank you for all the wonderful feedback you've given over the span of this fanfic!

I was considering breaking this up into two parts, but I figure you guys wouldn't mind if it was like 20 pages. .

* * *

"It's her! It's her!" Wufei watched in mixture of amusement and amazement as everyone scrambled to cram themselves in the doorway before throwing open the door.

Relena was about fifteen minutes late, standing in a cute pink pea coat with her hair in pin curls. She had a mischievous smile on her face and to her left stood a familiar face, cringing at the apparent death grip she had on his arm. Light blue dress shirt with a white undershirt and khaki shorts. Tousled brown hair, intense features... and a black eye?

"He ... ero..." Sally was the first to choke out in absolute amazement. If Heero had been afraid of being turned away at the door, he had been sorely misled. It took, to Wufei's near-approximate account, 3.4 seconds for the group to rush forward and embrace the two as if it was the most normal thing in the world.

Wufei hung back, away from the jabbering group of adults, and merely observed. Relena, had the most brilliant smile on her face he'd seen in quite a while. Occasionally she'd glance back as if to make sure her escort hadn't fled the scene in sheer emotional overload. Heero seemed less tense than the Chinese man remembered. There was something in the way he ran his hand through his hair as he spoke quietly to Quatre—almost as if it was a nervous habit he had possessed for a long time—that was at the same time strange, but relieving.

Wufei smiled inwardly. Apparently soldiers could change after all.

"Yuy." He nodded his head slightly to acknowledge the approaching man, "That's quite the shiner."

"Remind me to thank you for it later." He grumbled, eyes narrowing slightly.

"It's nice to see you again, Wufei." Relena slid up beside Heero, placing a delicate hand on his shoulder as she passed him. Wufei pushed himself off of the wall and embraced the small girl. She went so far as to place an innocent kiss on his cheek.

"Woman, did you bring my book?"

Relena laughed, ignoring the "I have been officially weird-ed out" look that crossed Heero's features briefly, and pulled an old paper back novel from her purse, "The Art of War is a brilliant piece, though I disagree with his strategy on defense."

"Of course you do. I would never expect anything else from a pacifist."

Heero broke into their conversation, "Where's Duo and Hilde?"

"And my precious god daughter...?" Relena looked around.

"The girls are in the kitchen and Duo is out by the BBQ catching his hair on fire." A new voice, Dorothy's, as she entered carrying a tray of cheese and crackers. Heero eyed her carefully; her hair was much shorter, barely past her shoulders, and the way she was dressed, her demeanor as she spoke to Quatre and Sally on the Maxwells' couch was almost...

Normal?

Maybe that was too strong of a word.

"That man is incapable of doing anything." Wufei muttered, heading outdoors to help him. There was a slight delay in his step though, as if he was hoping the man would, in fact, kill himself before he could reach him.

"Is that Relena's voice I hear?" Hilde's soft voice filtered in from the next room.

"Hi sweetheart, do you need any help?" Relena laughed, motioning for Heero to remain silent. Heero gave her a confused look, but allowed her to grip his hand and lead him into the kitchen.

Oh merciful heavens above, something smelled absolutely delicious. Heero's stomach was doing flip flops in sheer anticipation.

Hilde was washing off corn in the sink, a small figure to her right humming some childish tune he had never heard before. Her hair was a deep chestnut brown like her father's, but was tamed not in a braid, but a girly pink ribbon.

"Hey Hil, you never answered me..."

The little girl whipped her head around at a neck breaking speed. She couldn't have been older than five at the most; now that he was seeing her face, Heero could finally make out Hilde's features in the girl's nose and eyes.

"Auuuunnnntttiiiiiiieeeeeeeeee!!!!!"

... and her father's set of lungs...

"Hi, Lizabee!" Relena scooped the girl up as if she weighed nothing, "How's my favorite girl in the whole wide world doing?"

Elizabeth kissed her god mother on the cheek and squeezed her neck tightly. Hilde didn't turn around, but answered, "She's miserable. I'm being a slave driver by making her stand there and hold the corn waiting to be washed."

"Is there anything we can do to actually help you?" Relena set the girl down.

Hilde glanced back, "Well, you can pull the fruit platter out from the refrigerator and Heero can grab the other plate of hamburgers and--," She spun back around and clutched her chest, "Jesus Christ, Heero Yuy!"

"Not the same person." Heero replied elegantly, giving a nod in her direction. Relena laughed, but Elizabeth merely looked confused. Heero stuck out his hand, surprising both of the older women. Relena put Elizabeth on the ground, and Heero knelt to her height.

"I'm Heero Yuy."

The girl looked apprehensive and replied attentively, "Auntie Lena told me to never talk to strange men with dark brown hair."

Heero looked up accusingly at Relena, who had covered her mouth with both of her hands to hide her embarrassment. Hilde laughed so hard that she had to brace herself against the side of her butcher's block.

"Well," Heero gave Relena one final look of accusation, "I'm not a strange man if your Auntie knows who I am, am I?"

The girl seemed to roll this around in her mind for bit, "My name is Elizabeth Maxwell, I am pleased to make your acquaintance." Heero shook her small hand.

"It is an honor to meet you."

"Mr. Heero, what happened to your eye?" She asked, reaching out to touch it. Heero and Relena seemed to wince simultaneously.

"Elizabeth! Don't be rude to our guest!" Hilde reprimanded.

"Your Auntie Lena got upset with me." The mother shook her head in wild amusement.

The little girl gasped, shocked, "Auntie Lena _hit_ you?"

"Heero! Stop making me sound like bad person in front of my god daughter!" Relena stamped her foot and covered the little girl's ears, "and besides, you were the one that attacked me first!"

Elizabeth swung her head back around to stare Heero straight in the eye, "You tried to hurt Auntie?"

"No!" Heero gave Relena the mother of all death glares, "I would never hurt your Auntie! She's always known that." He wasn't speaking to the little girl anymore.

Relena took a step back at this, but recovered quickly, "Lizabee... I have some... presents for you in my bag, would you like to open them now?" She looked up for Hilde's sign of approval.

"YES!!!!!!!" The little girl launched herself towards the bags by the doors, "Uncle Quatre brought me presents too!! Do you want to see them, I really, really, really—"

Heero turned to Hilde once he could no longer hear their voices, "How have you been, Hilde?"

"Pregnant," the woman groaned, rubbing her stomach.

"How far along are you?"

"Six months."

"I see."

"Heero?"

"Hn."

"Why are you here?"

"Would you like me to leave? I'm sorry if I've caused any disturbance in your plans."

"No, I just..."

"Relena asked me the same thing when I tried to talk to her." He leaned backwards to watch the two girls ripping wrapping paper off gifts.

A knife appeared out of no where and was suddenly under his neck. Apparently there was truth to the rumors of violent mood swings experienced by the more gentle gender when impregnated.

"Heero. I am pregnant, sick, have been feeling overheated for the past five hours and my feet hurt like hell. If you fucking hurt my fucking friend I will fucking cut your fucking throat out."

Heero blinked.

"Understand?" Heero knew never to upset a German woman.

"Affirmative."

"Good!" She instantly perked back up to the happy girl he was familiar with, "I'll have you know that I was the only one that mildly defended you before Relena left her position."

"I didn't know there was anything to defend."

Hilde gave him a look and he silenced any further stupid statements.

"Heero, all I'm saying is, you're always welcome with us because we're your friends. If you're not back to try to have something serious—whether it be friendship or otherwise—with Relena, and if you're just planning on walking away and hurting her again, then you need to leave. Right now."

"I'm not going anywhere."

"Good," she repeated, "then I suggest you go outside and help the two idiot men out there, who are burning my beautiful hamburgers."

"Mission accepted."

Hilde laughed and began to drop the cobs of corn into the pot of boiling water. Outside a furry of "holy freaking fuck/damn/shit/hell/die/I hate you"s could be heard as Duo caught his braid in the grill, dropped the scalding hot spatula on Wufei's arm, and sent a plate full of raw hamburger meat spiraling towards Heero.

It was back to the usual routine.

* * *

Heero was in the dog house.

Or, rather, sitting at the dog house table.

For the little episode with the amazing flying hamburgers and sailor swearing, the girls had condemned them to sit at the old, rotting white wood table. Wufei had begun to idly peel the paint off the table, and Heero was actually afraid he might slide some into the braided man's potato salad.

Quatre, the lucky bastard, was sitting with the girls at the nice, clean table where all the clean utensils and food was (since the boys had dropped them, Hilde reserved her strict policy of the five second rule).

"Does Quatre always sit with them?"

Wufei looked up, shot the blonde a burning look at his back and went back to peeling.

Duo nodded mournfully, "He never gets in trouble. There was only once and that was when I spiked his pansy-ass lemonade and he got drunk and went on raving about how fabulous Dorothy was. He basically attacked her in the guest bed room."

Heero wished to block that image from his mind for all eternity. Erase, erase, erase!

"Barton sometimes has to sit with us, but it's only because he feels sorry and is trying to protect Maxwell." Heero understood something about Wufei then; the Chinese man, for all the eight years that they had conducted this interesting experiment, had somehow found it in his little black heart to not stab a fork through Duo's eyelids and seek vengeance for years of tormenting blabber and bad jokes. If he had been in Wufei's shoes, the paint would have been ingested by Duo at least seven years ago.

"Where is Trowa?"

"Coming, hopefully." Relena answered as she traded out the dirty burgers for a fresh new batch (Sally and Dorothy finally had to come out and do it themselves to ensure some survival of edible food). "Don't tell Hilde."

Duo grabbed her hands, "Jou-chan, I love you. You are the bestest jou-chan in the whole, wide universe." For a moment, she thought he would burst out into tears.

"Thank you." Wufei muttered, snatching a few away before they went down Emotional Volcano Duo's hatch and were never seen again.

"Why is he so late?" Heero wasn't going to let the topic go.

Relena looked a little uncomfortable and looked to the other boys for what she should say. Both shrugged and motioned for her to tell the story.

"Well, the last time Trowa came to visit me," she got a dark look on her face and stared at the other two boys, "or should I say when he was assigned to _protect me incognito_, he chased this stalker and ended up getting really hurt—,"

Wufei interrupted her, "Give him some credit, woman, how many 'stalkers' was it?"

"Five," She grumbled, "Anyway, he stayed with me for a while and I took care of him until Hilde and Duo offered when I got swamped at work. He's coming from his physical therapy appointment."

Heero tried to hide the fact that he was simmering deep inside; the fact that _he_ hadn't been informed, that _Trowa_ had been sent, and that _Trowa_ had stayed with her for what sounded like more than a few days...

Heero's little brain therefore began to twist reality and put together ends that otherwise seemed innocent. Heero was not a happy boy.

"So Heeeeeeero." Duo leaned forward, "Tell us what you've been doing these past few years?"

Heero gave him _the_ look.

"Aww, still anti-social as ever I see."

"Wait, wait." Sally interrupted from across the patio, "I want to hear the story about when you two met up."

"Oh. _OH._" Relena put her hands on her hips, "_I _am more than willing to tell _this _story."

Heero shrugged. He had seen nothing wrong with what he had done so he had nothing to be embarrassed of.

"So, I'm going on my morning run and it feels like someone is following me. I turn around, beat the crap out of him, and run like bloody hell back to my apartment. I'm at work explaining what happened during my break and, wouldn't you know it, Mr. Yuy shows up with a nice black eye.

"We're having a minor little argument in the storage room—I was _so_ mad—I told Heero that I never wanted to see him with anything less than a gunshot wound to the chest--,"

"Oh, _God._" Dorothy groaned, passing a hand over her face. Quatre looked shocked.

"You _didn't._ Man, please tell me you didn't." Duo begged, trying to avoid the notion that his friend was reduced to a pathetic stalker around his darling little 'Jou-san.

Heero shrugged again.

"Back to the story, I get a page about a gunshot wound to the chest and lo and behold, it is Mr. Yuy, bleeding out on the ER table."

"I was not bleeding out." Heero stated, indignantly.

"Heero! You flat lined for five minutes!"

"And then he followed you home like a little lost puppy?" Hilde supplied the rest, a smile adorning her face, "Duo, I think you just lost your title as the seven-time recipient of the Schmuck Award."

Duo untied his "Everyone Loves an Irish Girl" green apron and handed it to him, "I give this to you, my friend, because you are pathetic and are deserving."

Heero snatched it away and began to devour his burger. An award was an award, after all.

"But seriously, what have you been up to, Heero?" Relena moved back to her spot at the nice table.

Heero finished chewing before speaking—taking his sweet ass time of course—and folded his hands on the table, "Which year?"

"All the years."

"I left Preventer right after you, worked with the President to develop a better communication system between the Colonies and Earth, went to school and got a law degree, and most recently worked for Quatre in exchange for information about Relena's whereabouts."

Quatre gulped slowly, picked up his plate, and moved silently over to the Dog House Table. Dorothy and Relena both looked like they would castrate him.

"Thanks a lot guys," he grumbled.

"Ha _ha__._" Duo mocked, taking his third hamburger.

"Wait, Heero!" Relena stood up suddenly again, "If you're a lawyer and have been working for Quatre, why were you sleeping in a _dumpster_?"

Heero shrugged, "Old habits die hard."

"How is _that_ an old habit? I never slept in any dumpsters when I was in the war." Duo looked shocked.

"That's because you are weak, Maxwell." Wufei had slept in many dumpsters as well, and gave Heero a salute.

"OK, jeeze, let's make it pick on Duo day."

Hilde pushed herself up and out of her chair and brought her husband's head to her chest, giving a martyred sigh, "Oh, my poor, poor, dearest husband."

And then, the doorbell rang.

* * *

Heero wasn't amused in the least bit.

Trowa had seemed generally surprised, but pleased to see him. Heero almost felt a pang of sympathy for the other man as he hobbled up on crutches. Apparently the "five vicious stalkers" had managed to stab him/shoot him/some other method that had made his leg bleed profusely and muscles weak. He _almost_ didn't regret letting Relena fawn over him for what seemed like twenty minutes.

What he did regret, however, was letting the two go off by themselves so she could "see how his wound was healing."

Quatre had tried to explain the situation once he sensed Heero's drastic change in mood. Now, the one thing that had always confused Heero about Quatre was whether or not he had the ability to actually read other's thoughts, or just get a vibe about their emotions. To test his new hypothesis, he began to cuss the blonde out profoundly in his head until Quatre took a step back, looking scandalized and astounded. Dorothy gave him an amused look as she passed behind her husband and dragged him away to where Elizabeth was waiting to be pushed on the Maxwell's outdoor swing set. No answers there.

Sally came and sat beside him them, talking idly about Zechs and Noin and why they never came. Heero didn't exactly care, but Sally was the only one that would give him the slightest bit of information on the Relena slash Trowa relationship.

"Yeah, they've become really close. I'm not really sure what their relationship is." She confessed, much to his annoyance.

"Hn."

Sally laughed and stood up to help clear the table, "Well Heero, I guess that's what you get for making out with Relena's secretary instead of Relena. Funny how life works out."

OK. Did everyone know about the secretary thing? Not exactly the apex of his achievements.

He had carried dishes in, washed, dried, and put them back in their kitchen cabinets like an efficient machine ("I want to buy one of those to clean the house for me," Hilde commented to her husband as they watched him). He had, up to that point, respected his other two old friends enough to give them their privacy as they conducted a "wound inspection," but now that twenty minutes had passed, Heero was done being patient.

He crept up along up the stairwell to where he heard their voices. (Busted leg his _ass_, how did Trowa get up there? Magical fairy wings?) They were in the guest bathroom; the door slightly cracked so only a sliver of light splayed across the light blue carpet.

Heero avoided the light, and kept his face in the shadows.

"...It looks a lot better, the infection cleared up very nicely."

"Thanks to you. That medicine was a godsend."

Relena laughed that pretty, delicate laugh that made Heero's heart hurt every time he heard it, "I still feel so bad about this Trowa."

He laughed too. Not nearly as lovely.

"It wasn't your fault. Without your help and taking care of me... I mean, Relena..."

"Shhh... it's OK, Trowa. You don't have to say anything."

"I know, but I just wanted to tell you--,"

Heero bolted. He didn't want to hear it, didn't want to see it. He flew by Wufei and Hilde, who were talking pleasantly (did the madness ever end?), and headed straight toward the front door.

"Heero?" Hilde's voice caught up with him just as he put a handle on the door. Their previous conversation came rushing back to him.

"Don't worry," he began gruffly, "I'm just getting some air." She and Wufei were surprised he didn't try to slam the door behind him, given the anguished and tense expression that had crossed his features.

Heero laid down in the middle of their driveway, hoping someone would run him over.

The skies were vacant.

* * *

Relena tried to perk him up as they left the next day. She offered to drive him around New York once they got back. Honestly, she believed that his unhappiness came from the fact they had left so early and couldn't stay longer.

By the time they got back to New York, however, she was too tired to even offer again. Heero's face was stretched and he was obviously tired too. She did notice, however much in idle passing, that his six o'clock shadow looked quite dashing on him. From what she had seen in the four hours she had been awake, he didn't close his eyes once on the shuttle. He just stared impassively out the window and never even looked at her, even when she directly asked him a question.

They had regressed back eight years. He had lost about ten years in maturity as well.

Her keys jangled as her hands shook trying to get the door open. Heero noticed this, wondering whether she was just tired or had become angry with him. In all truth, he had been pondering how to bring the subject up with her about Trowa politely, as if he didn't care. The ten hour flight brought on a lot of reflection, and less than half of it was the good, wholesome kind.

He thought about her a lot, as he often found himself doing. How pretty she was, how kind, how smart, how athletic, how small, how she had pretty nails, how she dressed immaculately, how she was generally perfect. There was a part of him that wondered how he could become sensitized to these kinds of things so quickly. But he only had to look to her eyes, and he instantly knew the answer.

There had been other girls, like the secretary, but nothing had meant anything or had been driven by anything other than lust and curiosity. How could he ever give himself fully to her, when he didn't even know what he had to give? Granted, the secretary against the coke machine probably was not the best of choices (understatement of the century), but how was he supposed to know she held a personal vendetta against Relena? That Relena would come in that instant without him hearing or even seeing her?

How, as her head of security, could he have missed it?

Relena dumped her suitcases next to the front door and threw herself onto her couch. Heero stood in the doorway, watching as she leaned across the couch's arm, exposing some unexplored skin on her thighs, and switched on the answering machine. Ten new messages.

Heero moved silently to the bathroom.

beep

"Hi Le, this is Amy. Give me a call back so we can talk about hitting some clubs..."

beep

"Relena! Hey, it's Josh. You know the drill, but why the avoidance, babe—?"

beep

"Hey it's Jeff, hoping that you didn't find anymore crazy men on L2..."

beep

"Hey it's me, give me a call back..."

beep

"Relena, it's your brother," Heero hit his head against the cabinet he had been opening in surprise, "I'm just calling to check up on you. Please give me a call back when you have a chance. If Heero really is there, tell him he's dead." Relena's laughter filtered in.

beep

"It's your brother again; Noin wanted me to clarify that I would only kill Heero in a metaphorical sense and that it wouldn't be cruel and unusual. Unless you wanted it to be. Or—OK, OK, fine Noin—just call me back, all right?"

beep

"Relena, it's Une. Mariemaia loved her gift. Thank you so much for your thoughts..."

beep

"Hahahahaha! It's Karen!! I'm SOOOoooOOOOOOOOO WASTED!! HAHAHAHA!!! Where are you, dancing diva?! Oooo a Christmas tree--?! Oh, no only a stupid street light--"

"Wrong number!" Relena justified, horrified at her friend.

beep

"This is Molly from Nordstroms, I was just calling to let you know that your alterations are done and you can pick them up starting tomorrow..."

beep

Heero, meanwhile, continued to search through her bathroom drawers and cabinets, not caring if it invaded her privacy. There were many upon many twinges of irritation that more than one message on her machine was some pathetic guy begging for her attention. He needed some proof, some evidence that there really hadn't been anything noteworthy between Relena and Trowa during his stay. His mind had already worked out the possibilities, and it sent his heart convulsing.

He slipped into her personal bathroom, just off of her bedroom. Heero gave a second glance to her bed, but continued. The first cabinet. _The very first cabinet_.

"Lena, it's Trowa. I was thinking that if you weren't busy next month we could go catch a show together. Hope your flight was comfortable and safe..."

That was it. That was the bullet that ripped through Heero Yuy... that tore through his self control more than anything he had ever experienced in his life. The cardboard seemed to melt beneath his hands.

Relena was just getting up and moving towards the bedroom when she noticed his absence. She walked in slowly. He was sitting on her bed, holding a small box in his hands. Heero looked up.

"What's this?"

She took a step closer, "What's what?" Normally, she would have been pissed as hell to have found him going through her personal belongings without permission. But, there was just something in his eyes, something almost...

"What is this, Relena?"

Predatory.

Oh. She knew what that was.

He shook the half empty condom box in her face, almost tauntingly. Almost daring her to say who had used them.

"Did _Trowa_ use these?" His slight grin was sadistic.

She finally found her voice, "How...dare you?" She seemed embarrassed and enraged all at once, "How _dare you_ accuse me of...?"

He stood up and stalked toward her. She had never been afraid of him before, and she would most certainly not be now. The steps she took backward were only to pick up a heavy book from the bookshelf against the wall, to defend herself if necessary. Heero noticed this.

"Do you think I'm going to hurt you?"

"Heero, why are you acting like this?!" She snapped, "Why do you even care about _any_ of this?"

He seemed to snap out of his daze, taking a step back. He threw the box against the wall near her head but she didn't flinch. Heero retreated towards the bed, taking a seat. To Relena, he looked like that famous statue, his elbow resting on his thigh and his chin upon his hand. His features were set in stone, as if pondering the question for himself.

Relena slid her back down against the wall to the floor, never taking her wary eyes off of him.

Somewhere in the distance a pack of cats began to howl in agony to the moon. Cars honked, an ambulance drove by, and the people on the floor below began to argue violently, as often was their nature. The city never slept.

"I don't even remember her name. I guess I didn't think that that would be what I was remembered for, especially by you."

Relena sighed, "Her name was Gigina Selena."

Heero looked over, "What ethnicity is that, even?"

"I don't know, Skank-opian?"

"I didn't know about your history and that she hated you."

"Yeah, well, Heero, you didn't know a lot of things about me, I guess. You never really did take the time."

That seemed to upset him, "I know you."

Relena laughed bitterly, "Oh, please Heero. You don't even know what my favorite color is."

He stared intently at the digital clock as if it was going to flat out give him the answer, "I don't know."

Heero looked to her again, "But I do know that your favorite scent is vanilla, that you sleep under your covers, that when you get stressed out you try to tuck an imaginary piece of hair behind your ear, that you do really enjoy politics but your happiness lies in helping the common man."

"Heero..."

"I know that you hate dancing with old men, you like your coffee bitter and a little bit cold, and that you secretly love action and horror movies and hate sappy romantic ones. You used to joke that you would grow up an old maid with cats, but you want three kids, two boys and one girl and three dogs... that you wish you could have a normal conversation with your brother without the awkwardness that goes with it. I know you'd rather be in Sanc than here."

She lifted her face towards the ceiling, wondering why now, of all times, she'd feel the need to cry like a little girl. Heero walked over and crouched down in front of her.

"When you get sad you don't say anything, but you keep it bottled up inside and clench your hands together in front of you as if it's going to help. I know what type of tissues you like, that you always feel like you're alone even though everyone's there—I'm there—for you, I know what a wretch the Foreign Minister was to you but you never complained once...

"I don't know a lot about you, Relena. But I do know a few things. I wanted to come here to see if you'd let me know the rest."

"...You knew how I felt about you, all those years... how could you hurt me like that over and over again? Then you come here and expect everything to be better? That I would still feel the same way? Heero, you hurt me so badly, I didn't think I'd ever recover... and now that I finally have my life in order, that I'm doing what I used to dream about doing, you just take the liberty to waltz back in? It doesn't work that way in real life."

"Relena, when have we ever lived in 'real life'? When have we ever been normal people? You're not even happy here, and you know it!" He grabbed the sides of her face and forced her to look at him, "You know it, Relena."

She tried to pull away, but he held her firm, "I don't understand a lot of things about myself anymore. I don't understand why I'm jealous of Trowa, who I trust with my life, why I had to figure out, separate, and catalog emotions with other women just to understand what I felt about you. Why it felt like you physically slapped me when you told me off as you left..."

"You don't even care about me, Heero." She whispered, and finally did start to cry.

"I'll _make you_ see I care. Why I flew across the world, worked and begged Quatre for information about you, why I put up with Maxwell, why I'm talking and not grunting and running away—I'm like a mad man, Relena! I can't even control anything about myself anymore!"

Heero was upon her then, pressing her up against the wall with his forearm.. He kissed her roughly, pouring eight years of fantasy and frustration into it until both were starved for air. When he broke away ever so slightly, she looked to his eyes and knew that he wasn't finished.

The book slipped lazily from her hand, and landed heavily with the floor.

* * *

It was a cold morning, the kind that warranted staying beneath the covers and dozens of warm mugs of coffee and cider.

But that morning, a single figure sat wrapped in a wool blanket on the top of her apartment building. She gazed out onto the horizon, idly swinging her feet on either side of the rusted lawn chair she was sitting on.

Waking up next to Heero had been strange even if it had been something she thought and dreamt about constantly. Seeing how the covers had slid from his upper torso to his waist and how absolutely adorable the situation was with his mussed up hair and sleeping face. He had curled around her, protectively, as was often his nature, and she had felt genuinely safe with her face pressed up against his neck. Last night though...

Relena sighed and rubbed the sleep from her eyes.

She'd probably have to redo all of his stitches.

Heero had protested, grumbling incoherently, as he felt her warmth leave his body, but he didn't wake. There was a small twinge in her stomach, a wave of panic, which had sent her scrambling to get out of the room. She had _slept_ with him. _She had slept with him._

The Amazon warrior had crumbled and been replaced with the weepy old maid Relena, who thought herself ugly and insignificant. She wrapped the blanket tightly around her, waiting for the sun to come up and felt very naked to the world below.

In her dreams she was always amidst a swell of people that rushed past her, bumped into her, some even passing through her. Up here, however, she was alone. She was scared, confused, and emotionally drained. There was apart of her that was scared to go back downstairs to see that he had left without a trace. That he had used her because she had become an unachievable goal.

A loud burst of noise came from the outside door as it banged open against the concrete wall next to it. A boxer clad figure ran towards her, collapsing on the concrete beside her. Relena raised her brows to her hairline, pleased to have her weepy introspective moment shattered.

"I just ran... up and down... fifteen floors since... the elevators... were broken.... looking for you... I ran three, four blocks.... through the park... cut my feet on a broken bottles...almost got hit by a taxi...finally came up here... and found you."

"Thanks for the report, Heero. Do you have the weather too?"

"Thirty three degrees, slight wind chill, clouds coming in from the east. Likely to snow."

"Thorough as always, Mr. Yuy." She opened up her blanket slightly and sat up, indicating her permission for him to share it.

He waved her off. After all, if he got sick, she'd be_ forced_ to take care of _him_.

"Do you come up here often, wearing nothing but a blanket?"

"Just about as often as I sleep around with men, especially ex-Gundam pilots, according to you."

Heero blinked, trying to digest what she had just snapped at him.

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to imply that you were lacking in morals—though your vocabulary has gone swiftly downward."

"Fuck you." She turned around and faced the other direction. She held in an unladylike snort; whatever new language she had learned came from New York, and New York alone.

He stood up, placing both hands on her shoulders and leaning his chin against the top of her head. Heero was about to smartly point out that the sun rose facing the other direction, but he kept his comments to himself. She was tense, and as much as he wanted to just throw her over his shoulder and put her back in bed, he resisted.

"Heero," She began using her steeled diplomatic voice, "You have five seconds to go downstairs, get your things, and get out of New York. Otherwise you're stuck here with me, in our strange situation, in which you can't regret last night, and you can't ever leave me, or make out with strange women on my favorite coke machines."

"I had longer when I self destructed Wing." Was that a whine she detected in his voice?

"One..."

Heero began to rub her shoulders, finally feeling how cold it was outside.

"Two..."

He began hoping from foot to foot, trying to remove them from the cold concrete.

"Three..."

"FOUR..." He quickly added, desperate to get inside.

She turned around in wonder, utterly shocked to see him with goosebumps prickling his skin. So the perfect soldier had one weakness after all! This fact further served to endear him to her.

She smiled. Maybe she hadn't ever been really angry with him? Just disappointed in his choices? Just sad because it hadn't been her? It made her feel incredibly stupid to realize that she had wanted him all along—the minute she saw him on the beach, throughout the war, when he randomly became her head of security, when she cussed him out, when he shot himself in the chest.

Maybe life wasn't a fairytale, but they weren't normal people living a normal life. A fairytale ending for them...

She opened her blanket again and stood up; this time Heero went straight for it, Relena wrapping the blanket around him, and he wrapping his arms around her.

"Five?" He finished, wondering why she became silent so suddenly.

OK, so he wasn't going to go. He had stalked her in the park because he did care about her. A part of her had suspected that he would flee like a bat out of hell, and the other part was throwing a fiesta in her stomach.

"You know, you really were a jerk to me, Heero."

He nodded, mournfully, still dancing from foot to foot.

"And you know it's going to take a really long time to make it up to me?"

He nodded, starting to inch them towards the exit and stairway.

"And that you're going to have to stand up here for at least another ten minutes?"

Heero's head fell against her shoulder, but he didn't protest. She felt her heart swell slightly, and her grip around him tightened. With him near, the warmth beneath the blanket tripled.

"Hey Heero."

"Hn?"

"Blue."

"What?" He lifted his head to look her straight in the eye, a strangely perfect mixture of prussian and aquamarine.

Relena leaned in, a mischievous smile crossing her face as she whispered.

"Blue. My favorite color is blue."

He kissed her, "Mine too."

* * *

_twiddles her thumbs_

OK, I had Heero being less sentimental in an earlier version. The reason I switched it from Heero being primal to Heero trying to be sentimental is because it felt like I was betraying you all with a half-assed clichéd ending.

Another reason this chapter took so long: School. I'm out now. Can I get a hip hip hooray?

Other reason: I hate the way that I write characters going from hate to a relationship. I'm sorry if it seemed like she forgave him so quickly and he's out of character. They spent a lot of time apart? Err?

Thanks for all your patience and for reading! Please let me know if you enjoyed the ending. 3333

2004 Ophe


End file.
